Lights On

As I approached the turn off- I saw the phone booth that’s reported to have a little girl wearing all-white that appears in it. My heart leapt when I made the turn— but only an empty phone box appeared.

Any solo hesitations were rendered redundant as I ran into a clutch of families also on the same nature outing.

With the wave of an imaginary wand— the tiny phosphorescent motes of light filled the sky. The rush of the creek beneath the cement bridge provided the backdrop to a chorus of frogs as the fireflies danced above.

I thought of magic and small miracles. Heartbeats made more— the primal awakening of a sight that harkens back seventy thousand years. I stood within the same valley as a historic battlefield the Mongols fell upon as this tranquil site.

I took no photos or videos— knowing they’d be incapable of capturing what snares the soul. I stood in the warm, freshly bloomed summer darkness and watched a symphony of light play out before me.

Sunken Spiders & Parts of a Cosmic Web

The tide is rolling quick. The white foam of broken waves washes the stone barriers at the base of the hill. There’s no beach to be found.

At my back is a forest stretching into a jungle. Snaking vines wrap between dotted pines— the rest is covered in a blanket of towering shrubs.

A floral spice flavors the air— beating back the ever-present salt spray from below.

I keep reading a passage by Rene Magritte about the folly of cynicism and how we mistakenly believe life must be seen in a tragic light.

As if the greater the terror, the greater the objectivity. That somehow it grants us an understanding to the mystery of existence.

How terrified we must be if we believe to deny joy will spare us from pain.

Even more— that we might be spared from anything. That we might exist outside of the whole. Outside of the continual movement and change of the universe.

We are spared nothing.

And thus we must remember that we are not spared joy.

We are not spared love.

Misery is no more eternal than joy.

It is not within us to understand.

It is to keep asking.

Cynicism is tied to believing we might understand— and being afraid of what it is we think is.

Joy is to revert to a state where awe is achievable.

It is through subtraction that the shed ourselves from the suffering that comes from our artificially formed identities being under threat.

We are changing— to desperately cling to an idea about oneself that isn’t true. That isn’t relevant— it brings us into a state of suffering.

We lose the ability to stay in the present and in such— we lose access to joy.

Unfortunately there is no guidebook to this.

More of a reminder that you cannot cling to a singular note if we’re meant to be living a symphony.

Doomed

I wondered how you could fool an entire world, but remembered your hand upon my face and knew the world blessed in its ignorance.

Foretold stories of doom do not speak of cinnamon and blooming flowers. They do not speak of silk ribbons or wind chime laughs.

Doom isn’t accompanied by love, rather, serves as a post or prelude.

Yet, with the swish of a skirt and low curtesy, it arrived together in the form of Mira Saltori.

I knew I was in trouble. The same way a kid does as they pause on the top step of the stairs— hoping to hear what their parents are saying. Bated breath held no hope of stopping the world— or the inevitable tide that was the scion of Saltori.

Fare Ride

The mists have descended upon the island. Sheets of rain fell from the sky last night. In the morning warm vapors rose from the ground. I’ve never seen such a mix of green in my life. It seems the entire island is bathed in its shades.

The bounce of the tired suspension as the taxi slogs through another pothole. The growl of loose metal from a sagging exhaust provides a soundtrack to the slow passage through mountainside mist.

Even as I close my eyes— I can place where we are on the road— I have spent many a lucid dream state in the back of these cars.

“I have to tell you something,” she said. The words echo as the lines on her face harden. What words could prove harder than those of grief?

I didn’t want to know—

Sitting on the steps of a torn down school— as if straddling a forgotten entrance to faerie, I listened to words that left the world in a ringing haze.

I leafed through an old notebook to stop upon a inky snippet—

“The outline of a shattered star,”

and a brief story of the cosmic rejects.

Time is a relative thing— an uncanny bastard when we think ourselves outside its purview.

Nothing is outside— nothing is static.

The solar system sees us in motion— and time sees that we travel forward— when life and space asserts that if you head down far enough, you will once again discover the sky.

Prized

“He’s called the ‘Map Maker’ and he’s the one man that needs to stay alive.”

“What’s so fucking important about a cartographer?”

“James, he’s not a cartographer. He’s the one man that knows all the locations of the safe houses within the organization.” James gave Dan the defeated look of a man that just dropped his microwave burrito after a fourteen hour shift.

“I really hate it when you do that.”

Dan slapped James on the shoulder before walking to the door, “Maybe you should start using that brain a little bit more then.”

“Maybe you should nah nah nah…” James mumbled as he followed Dan. Never a chance to make it through a meeting without getting nagged.

Squids & Stars

It’s called the brightest sea in the world— ethereal lights shining like alien beacons as I stare from the rain mottled cement steps of my apartment building. The squid boats bob on the waves.

The sea air swells with the summer heat— the first frogs of May sing a basso encore three seasons late. The fireflies will be lighting the groves beyond the outskirts of town.

The change of the season reminds me of my first days on the island— and long ago summer nights when I first came to Japan as a kid.

Now I listen to the dappled drops of rain as the typhoon season approaches. I still have no ready words for recent discoveries— but I know it’s importance when sharing it with others brings a brief silence.

A changing path need not harken fears when the nature of the heart remains the same.

Twenty years ago— now— and ten years on. I can see the filament leading between the bulbs of memory and fancied projection. A glow will remain about these times like the favored plants of the fireflies— and in time— I will forget the cold & loneliness.

As it did before— the weighted warmth of the humid countryside summer will flavor the golden-lit memories.

And perhaps I will think of the stretch of lights hanging over the horizon— searching for answers in the deep.

Birds Eye View

I stood at the top of Uchiyama pass as rain drizzled overhead— The Chinese Sparrowhawk observatory fielded no bird viewing, but that wasn’t why I wanted to go.

I wanted the bird’s eye view of my situation—

The frogs croak in the rice paddies at night. The summer heat creeps in like the many-legged bugs whose names elude me, if not their presence.

Yesterday I watched a Japanese Marten blast up a hillside like a runaway train. A massive fish kept leaping out of the water in the Toyo bay. The sunshine did its best to dispel the latent melancholy as I struggled to understand how I felt about hearing about a terminated pregnancy a year ago. I heard last weekend— nearly a full year after it happened.

I had thought my heart had taken an awful beating this year. At times, it felt as if I was paying back the interest on a lifetime of loans.

After hearing the news, I drove back down to Izuhara and cried.

I wept knowing there was nothing to be done. That the smart decision had been made, and that as ever, we continue forward. But I wept— because something that had long been an out of reach dream had become a reality without my knowledge.

There was no panic or deciding to be had— it had been decided for a year. And I know the weight it carries, not even being the one to carry.

Return

Back across the sea— a joyous two week fever dream coming to a close.

Wingtips trail the surface of the waves alongside the ship.

The words are brewing like the elixir in a witch’s cauldron. They’ve yet to bubble to the surface— still rolling on the bottom— waiting for a day more to fashion their outward appearance.